ProBlogger Podcast: Blog Tips to Help You Make Money Blogging

Today is the first episode in a 12-part series we’re running on the ProBlogger podcast over the next few weeks. We’re handing the podcast over to you - the listeners and readers of ProBlogger - to tell your story of how you started your blog and what’s happened since. As I said a couple of weeks ago, in the second week of January we’ll be releasing a brand new (and completely free) course on how to start a blog. And in the lead up to that we wanted to feature stories of bloggers who've already started. Head to problogger.com/startablog for more info on the course In each episode you’ll hear a story (and in some cases two or three) of a blogger who will share: a mistake they made starting out something they’re grateful that they did a tip for new bloggers something good that's happened since they started. We’ve chosen bloggers from different parts of the world and different niches, and I hope you come away from this series with a little inspiration and a few practical tips to start your next b

What You Should Include in Your Email Newsletters (and Answers to 4 FAQs About Email) Do you email your blog readers regularly? Maybe you put ‘set up email newsletter’ on your ‘someday’ list ages ago, but still haven’t done it. Or maybe you have a newsletter list, but you haven’t sent one in months. You might think it’s optional – something you can do once you've finished everything else on your to-do list. You might even think email is dead (or at least old-fashioned), and that you’re better off building connections through social media. (Which is nothing new, by the way. I was talking about bloggers having similar concerns nine years ago.) The truth is, email is still one of the best ways (if not the best way) to connect with your blog’s readers. Email is a big part of my strategy on both of my blogs. It drives traffic, and helps us build our community, understand who's reading our blog, and monetize both directly and indirectly. If you’re not using it, you really are missing out. But what do you

An Invitation for YOU to Be Featured on the ProBlogger Podcast Today's podcast is a little different. It's an invitation for YOU to be featured in an upcoming episode of the ProBlogger podcast. Early next year we’ll be releasing a brand new free course for bloggers to help them launch their blogs. And in the lead up we want to feature stories and tips from ProBlogger listeners and readers who've already started their own blogs. So if you’ve started a blog, whether it was recently or a long time ago, we’d love to include you in the series. Links and Resources on I'd like to Feature YOU on the ProBlogger Podcast Blogging What’s Your Story? Facebook Group Join the video challenge in our Facebook group Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Hi there, it’s Darren from ProBlogger. Welcome to Episode 219 of the ProBlogger podcast. Today I’ve got something a little bit different. Nor

Using the SMART Approach to Set Your Blogging Goals for 2018   It’s that time of year where many of us are reviewing the year gone by and setting our blogging goals for 2018. Goal setting is really important in any venture. Without goals, your actions tend to be aimless and random. By setting something specific to aim at, you'll  be motivated and more focused in your efforts. A lot has been written about goal setting over the years. But one way to set your goals is to use the SMART approach, where SMART is an acronym for characteristics of good goals. Most people say Peter Drucker came up the idea, while others say it was George Doran. In any case, both men were almost certainly contributors. Today I want to work through one version of it (there are a number of subtle variations) and see what we can learn about it as bloggers. Join our Facebook Group Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view

4 Things to Consider When Choosing a Domain Name for Your Blog This episode is perfect for anyone who's preparing and planning their first blog, as well as those thinking about starting a second blog. Note: if you are starting a blog sign up below to get notified of our brand new course on the topic which will go live early next year - and check out our article on how to start a blog in 5 steps. Today I'm talking about what to consider when naming your blog and choosing a domain name for it. I'll share four things to consider when choosing a domain name. You want one that: helps you achieve your goals will have a memorable impact on your visitors helps you to build your brand sends the right message to Google and the search engine bots. (Domain names have an impact on SEO.) I'll also talk about legal implications of choosing a domain name, because it's important to stay within the law. Links and Resources on 4 Things to Consider When Choosing a Domain Name for Your Blog: 4 Things to Con

How and Why You Should Create Style Guides for Your Blog In today's episode, I talk about style guides for blogs – why they’re important, and what elements you should include in yours. Links and Resources for How to Create a Style Guide for Your Blog AP Stylebook The Chicago Manual of Style Virtual Tickets Facebook group Further Reading and Listening for How to Create a Style Guide for Your Blog 10 Writing Tips to Help You Sound More Human How and Why to Create a Blog Style Guide How to Create a Content Style Guide to Improve Your Blog’s Quality How to Create a Writing Style Guide Built for the Web Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Hi there. Welcome to Episode 216 of the ProBlogger Podcast. My name is Darren Rowse and I’m the blogger behind problogger.com – a blog, podcast, event, job board, and a series of ebooks all designed to help you as a blogger to start a

Ways You Can Simplify Your Business and Increase Your Blogging Profitability Today, I want to share two big lessons I learned this year at our Australian ProBlogger events. They were lessons I think apply to many aspects of blogging and online business. It’s all about simplifying what you do while making more profit. I’m heading to Dallas for our Success Incubator event and to speak at FinCon in a few days time.  So I'll be taking a couple of weeks off the podcast to travel and focus on the event attendees as much as possible. In the meantime, dig into the archives. There are now 215 to choose from. Recommended Further Listening for the Next Couple of Weeks: Episode 137 - 7 Days to Finding Your Blogging Groove Join our Facebook group Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Hi there. My name is Darren Rowse. Welcome to Episode 215 of the ProBlogger Podcast. ProBlogger is a blog,

4 Difficult Realities All Bloggers Face During a conference last year I was invited to have dinner with three other bloggers who had all been blogging for 5-10 years and were now doing it full-time. It was a fun dinner, and we covered a lot of ground in terms of conversation. But during dessert the conversation got a little deeper as one of them began to share how they were struggling with their blog. On their surface, their blogging was going okay. They had a great readership, and the content they were putting out was going well. But on the inside they felt disillusioned. And as they continued their story, I looked around the table and saw a lot of nodding going on. Their story was resonating with us all. I related to it a lot. Blogging can be hard sometimes, and it's to become disillusioned. As a blogger I’ve heard people rave about my, blog with comments like: "You’re so prolific!" "How do you stay so productive?" "How did you write that way?" But on the inside I’ve wondered why they can’t

10 Things I Wish I Knew About Blogging and Content Marketing When I Started Today, I want to share the audio of a keynote I gave at a conference early last year about 10 things I wish I’d known about blogging and creating content for content marketing when I started. In episodes 204 and 205 I shared some recordings of keynotes I’ve given, and the response from many of you was that you wanted to hear more of that style of podcast. So today I dug out a talk I gave at the Super Fast Business conference, which is run by James Schramko here in Australia.s James, who puts on a great event, asked me to share some of my story and give some practical tips on content creation. I talk about defining what your blog is about, the three phases of creating great content, how to mix up the different types of content you feature on your blog, idea generation, creating ‘content events’ on your blog, and how to differentiate yourself in your content.    I loved doing this talk, and I hope you enjoy it too. Don’t forget t

Evergreen Content Ideas for Bloggers: Part 2 Today I want to talk about evergreen content, and want to suggest seven more types of evergreen content you might like to try on your blog. This episode is essentially part two of what I started in episode 209, where I suggested the first seven types of evergreen content. But whether you listen to this one first and then that one, or listen to that one first and then this one, you should get some ideas either way. 7 More Evergreen Content Ideas for Your Blog Influencers to Watch in Industry Bloggers to Watch in 2017 XX Habits of successful xxxxx 10 Habits of Highly Effective ProBloggers 5 Good Photography Habits to Start Today 3 Habits Every Outdoor Photographer Should Develop to Avoid Missing Shots The 9 Conversion Habits of the World’s Most Successful Bloggers 5 Photography Pitfalls to Avoid That No One Tells You About 4 Mistakes Beginning Landscape Photographers Make 9 Bad Habits of Photographers History of (topic/brand/product/industry)

Advice from Pat Flynn on How to Create a Successful Podcast Today I have a treat for anyone who has ever considered starting a podcast (or already has one), because I’ve just finished a Skype call with Pat Flynn about the art of podcasting.   As I’ve mentioned in the past, Pat’s teaching on podcasting is the number one thing that helped me as I was starting the ProBlogger podcast two years ago. If it wasn’t for him, I probably wouldn't have started at all. And so I was very excited when he launched his Power-Up Podcasting course earlier this year, because I knew it would help many more Pre-Podcasters get into this amazing medium. Pat spoke at our Aussie ProBlogger events earlier in the year (he'll also be speaking at our Dallas event in October), and during that event we talked about how often I heard ProBlogger readers say things like "I really should start a podcast". It’s a statement I hear all the time. But it's almost always followed up with something like "But I don’t know where to begin"’ or "Bu

How Many Live Posts Do You Need When You Launch Your Blog Today, I want to answer a question almost every blogger asks when they start blogging: How many posts should I have live before I launch my blog? It's a common question I get, and while I’ve mentioned a few approaches in other episodes today I'm tackling the topic specifically. So if you’re starting a blog for the first time, or thinking of starting a second blog, this podcast is for you. Links and Resources Vanessa’s blog Digital Photography School Dallas Event Facebook Group Facebook Live on me using Adobe Spark Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Hi there. Welcome to episode 210 of the ProBlogger Podcast. My name is Darren Rowse. I’m the blogger behind problogger.com – a blog, podcast, event, job board and a series of ebooks all designed to help you as a blogger to grow your blog, to start that blog, to grow

7 Types of Evergreen Content for Your Blog Today I want to talk about Evergreen content, and suggest seven types of evergreen content you might like to try on your blog. I’ve got loads of advice for you today, and in today's show notes I have a lot of examples you’ll want to check out. Some are from my blogs, but there are also a lot from listeners who put examples of their own evergreen content in our FB group. 7 Types of Evergreen Content To Create On Your Blog How to Content How to Start a Blog How to Hold a Camera Beginners Tips for Night Sky Photography Advanced Tips for Tack Sharp Images How to Recover Images from a Damaged SD Card 5 Ways to Write Faster How to Replace a Face in Photoshop in 6 Easy Steps Frequently Asked Questions What is a Stop? The Common Currency of Exposure Explained What the Numbers on your Lens Mean How Often Should I Post? How Long Should Posts Be? How to Shoot in Low Light – 9 Commonly Asked Questions Can You REALLY Make Money Blogging? [7 Things

Get Better Facebook Page Results With These 5 Actionable Tips Today, I want to present you with five actionable things you can do to increase the effectiveness of what you do to build your business on Facebook - particularly from Facebook pages. I know there’s a lot of pain and frustration among bloggers when it comes to Facebook pages. Just a short year or two ago FB was a major source of traffic, engagement and even monetization for many of us. But increasingly over that time FB has been making organic reach and engagement harder and harder. So today, I’ve invited someone who understands FB as well as anyone I’ve ever met to chat with us about how to approach the social network. That person is Rachel Miller from Moolah Marketing, whose teaching has had an incredible impact my own FB strategy in the past six months. Rachel began her journey as a blogger, but in more recent times has created FB pages that reach millions of fans. She has a real knack for building audiences and then monetizing them. I m

Blogger Apps for Smartphone and Tablet Today, I want to take you on a tour of my iPhone and iPad, and talk about the apps I use most in my blogging and online business activities. One of the biggest changes that has happened in my blogging since I began back in 2002 is the technology I use. In the early days it was all done purely through my old desktop PC (and by old I mean really old) and via dial-up internet. Things were so simple. I started on Blogger and everything that went on my blog was written directly into it. Adding images or video to my posts were not even something I considered as my internet speed was too slow and my computer not really powerful enough to do anything with them. But since that time a lot has changed. For me, it started with an upgrade of computers (I bought myself a little white apple iBook with my first earnings) and upgrading to ADSL internet. I also remember around that time I got my first phone (a Nokia if my memory serves me correctly) that allowed me to go online and

Is There a Right Way to Brand Your Blog? I’m just back from our Aussie Problogger training events where we ran masterminds with around 40 bloggers per city. In those days speakers spent time with small groups of attendees in round table discussions where attendees could ask us any question they liked. One of the questions that I got asked repeatedly through both masterminds was around whether it is better to give a blog a personal brand or more of a business brand? In one case the questioner was about to start a new blog and was wondering if they should set it up on a domain that was their own name or if they should choose a name that was nothing to do with them. Another blogger asked what to do when they felt trapped on a blog with a personal domain - but they wanted to introduce other writers onto the blog. Yet another blogger had the opposite issue - they had set up their blog on a domain and with a brand that was very niche specific but now felt trapped because they wanted to change their focus and e

How to Overcome 5 Blogger Obstacles As I record this, I’m just home from our first ProBlogger event of the year in Brisbane and am preparing for our next one in the coming days in Melbourne. The Brisbane event was really worthwhile. We heard from Pat Flynn, Jadah Sellner, James Schramko, Kelly Exeter, Shayne Tilley and Laney Galligan and had a couple of days of great teaching and inspiration - including a day with a small group masterminding their businesses. Each year at our events, I open the event with a keynote. This year I spoke about evolving your blog rather than getting into a ‘revolving’ pattern (or going in circles). I will share more on that topic on the podcast in the future but as we’re very much focused this week on our events and serving our attendees I wanted to give you another taste of what we do at our events and share with you the opening keynote from a previous year as this week’s episode. I did this in the last episode too and got a lot of positive feedback and hope you’ll enjoy this

How Ordinary Things Can Lead to Extraordinary Results With Your Blog This week and I’m excited to be spending time face to face with quite a few ProBlogger podcast listeners and blog readers at our Aussie blogging events. We’ve been holding annual Australian events since 2010 and it is a highlight of my year each time. It’s fantastic to put faces to names, hear the stories of what bloggers are learning and to get inspired by meeting many of you. So because I’m away this week and busy with the event I thought it might be fun to give you a taste of what happens at a ProBlogger event and to play you a talk I gave at one of our events a few years ago. So for today’s episode (#204) I’m going to play you a full opening keynote talk that I gave in 2014. It’s a talk I gave which explores how doing ordinary things consistently over time leads to extraordinary results in blogging. Often bloggers look for the 'secret' strategies that will launch their blog into a viral success. However the reality is that most su

How to Connect With Influencers in Your Niche Today I want to share some teaching on how to approach influencers and other well known people in your niche (or outside it too). One of the most powerful ways to grow your profile, audience and brand is to connect with others in your niche. The benefits of doing it can be many and varied - the opportunities that flow from these interactions can be pretty cool for the growth of your blog…. BUT doing it the wrong way can also hurt your blog and brand - so I want to share what NOT to do. Links and Resources for How to Approach Influencers in Your Niche A 10-Point Plan for Connecting with Online Influencers (Without Turning into a Suck-Up) Our FB Group Our Dallas Event Our Australian Events Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Good day there. My name is Darren Rowse. I’m the blogger behind ProBlogger.com – a blog, podcast, event, j

Veteran Blogger Chris Garrett on How to Build a Successful Blog Today’s episode is #202 and in it I have my good friend and co-author of the ProBlogger book - Chris Garrett on the show to talk about the changes in blogging since we wrote the book. Chris and I wrote the first edition of the book in 2008 and it went through 3 versions - the last one being 5 years ago in 2012 - so I thought it might be interesting to get Chris on to talk - among other things - about how we’d update the book if we were to do another version. The book still holds up pretty well and continues to be available on Amazon but a lot has happened in 5 years! Chris and I cover a lot of other ground too: Chris tells his story of starting blogging in 1996 and describes how he first monetized what he was doing - in many ways it was ‘content marketing’ years before anyone used that term. We talk about the two main reasons bloggers start blogging - because they want to express themselves and because they want to make money - and try t